Paintball

I love the sport of paintball and would love if you gave it a try.

I’ve played paintball for some years now, at least a decade and a half. This sport makes you remember it for weeks at a time if you haven’t already gone back before your welts heal.

It’d be a lie to say paintballs don’t hurt but, the better grade of paint you (or your enemy rather) use greatly effects the amount of pain you will feel. There were paintballs a long time ago that were notorious for not popping on target, or the ground for that matter at times. However, that has changed greatly due in part to a sport who’s players demand more from the industry than to be shooting rocks at each other. Low end paintballs usually start around $35 for a case of 2000 and high end paint can be had from $60-80 per case. What you are getting for that price is more accuracy, less pain, brighter fill paint and less breaks/dimples from the box. That does not mean if you have a low end paintball marker you can put high end paint in it and have it shoot laser like shots. In fact if your marker does not run soft enough through the bolt and air system it may break every high end paintball you end up putting in it. If you have “some paintball gun,” start with something in the mid to low end to save on cost and frustration. If you are at the field and see people buying a lot of a particular paintball give that one a shot. A lot of time the quality of the paintballs you are buying is dependent on how long it’s been in the store and how well the employees take care to rotate the boxes. So, if you buy paint that you see other people buying chances are you will be getting more fresh paint. Meter that information against the quality they are buying and you have an informed buying decision even if just off the cuff. And just to save you a bit of embarrassment at the counter, every manufacturer has a different grade scale. Some go by “level,” while others will go by “stars,” or “recreational,” on the low end and “tournament,” at the high end. Not a big deal but it’s kind of a funny thing I’ve noticed at various fields. If you have any questions most players can answer basic questions and obviously always use the staff as a resource of information.

Here is a brief list of the most common paintball brands

• Defy
• HK Army
• XO
• G.I. Sports
• First Strike
• Tippmann
• Zap
• Valken
• Empire

Markers

Now, when it comes to markers there are many different opinions and styles. Let’s start as far back as I can remember, without getting to specific. In the beginning there were only pump style markers used for marking trees and cattle. These quickly turned into the first recreational paintball devices as people in forest service are generally inherently tough and believe me these setups hurt. Was it the full on oil based fill, or the thick enough to get through brush shell, maybe it was the lack of FPS control? Personally I think it was the fact that these were never intended for use on people, but thank goodness they did. What came after was a sport filled with passion and PEG.

tournament style

Paintball markers or “guns,” have advanced to be more safe, more reliable (in some cases), more air efficient, and far more accurate. Even at the lower end of the scale you can find operable markers at around $60 (Kingman Spyder Victor). That’s more along the lines of someone looking to play a few games on a piece of private land or even a decent size backyard assuming you can find compressed air or CO2. The rest of this article will be centered around people with intentions of playing at least a fair amount of paintball. For reasons I will not get into too much moving forward, we are also only going to be considering compressed air. CO2 is not great to use due to the way it’s properties interact with the materials used in paintball markers. I tell most people I meet looking to start playing to budget for $200-$300 for something reliable that they can upgrade in the future. Since there are so many different situations for each person it’s very hard to recommend just one marker for every person. If I had to pick just one all encompassing marker it would be the Planet Eclipse EMEK 100. In my opinion this marker represents the next step in paintball by bringing a lot of what Planet Eclipse has learned to a much more attainable price point coming in at around $220. The biggest reason I recommend this marker is it does not require batteries, followed by stellar reliability, and great air efficiency. The EMEK is quickly becoming a great upgrade platform for the mechanical games and tournaments that are popping up all around as well. If you go this route I recommend getting a good barrel kit first. A barrel kit will allow you to bore match your paint as you need due to weather and other factors that effect your paintballs. This alone will greatly increase the performance of your marker’s accuracy, it will also slightly increase your air efficiency, and decrease your sound signature. If you only did one thing for any paintball marker let it be a barrel kit. Going up in price a bit we arrive at the Dye Rize CZR or Empire Mini GS at around $300 these are the entry point tournament style markers for people looking to be a bit more competitive. These are both electronic markers that feature different firing modes and adjustments to fire rate and cycle timing. After that things get a little more broad in a lot of ways. The markers in the $400 plus area vary in terms of quality, materials, adjustment categories, game timers, some are electric some are not, and some are vary reliable while others are known burdens to maintenance and cleaning. Be sure to due your due diligence and research the marker you want to buy before actually purchasing it. If you can, go to a paintball store and check the fit in your hands. In terms of out of the box quality and reliability Planet Eclipse really takes the cake but can be very expensive brand new with exception to the EMEK 100 that I mentioned earlier. On the other end of things for the mechanically inclined there are autocockers. These are the industry standard for “learning the game,” this style has been around for a long time for many reasons first of which being the aftermarket parts available for them. From pump and semi to full electronic with a cheater board these markers have been built and continue to be built in the most fun and personal ways. Though, they do carry the tittle for just about the most maintenance involved in a paintball marker per game. The DLX LUXE is another high end marker boasting a high price tag and not so great reliability in the past but I hear the latest are much more prone to field time rather than tech time. These can be had as high as $2,000 and as “low,” as $1,600 for this year’s model the LUXE X.

Woodsball

As the name implies woodsball is mostly played in the Farkin woods. The Farkin woods are located just out of eye sight of town but just before you get to a government property. There lie the Farkin woods. So now you know where, I suggest keeping to the daylight for the first couple runs at any new place to observe and reduce natural obstacles. However one of the more fun and intriguing part of this milsim style subset of paintball is that most the people that play this style are used to a more “gorilla,” approach to playing this fine sport and will most likely be down to play at night in the Farkin woods. A quick suggestion for this style is to bring spray bottles and brushes in case something that shouldn’t have paintball mess on it gets hit and you intend on return.

“If someone plays paintball in the Farkin woods, but there is no mess. Were they ever Farkin there?